When Will Child Support Arrears Cause a Passport to be Revoked

My question involves child support in the State of: Florida

I've been living outside of the US for 6 months with dual citizenship (but not currently eligible for a foreign passport). I make monthly child support payments, but only about 1/2 of the $1,000 I was ordered. For over a year, I've been trying unsuccessfully to take my ex back to court to lower the monthly payment because the circumstances for the high value (1 child) is no longer valid. I'm a full time student, and my university program require a short trip outside the country. I'm afraid to travel because I know I've exceeded the $2,500 arrears threshold. Am I able to travel between two non-US countries with a US passport?

Thank you for any feedback!

What you view as a high value and what state law allow are not necessarily the same. Your passport might be suspended already. Apparently the problem is not the child needing support, it is the deadbeat non-custodial parent who would rather hide in a classroom than work and support their child. Interesting that they can afford intercontinental plane fare and not child support. I'm sure the court will love to hear that before the finding of contempt.

Disagreeable, i specifically stated the amount and payment amount to try to clarify some details about the case. Based of state statues, the amount I should pay is less than $500 a month. I'm having difficulties getting my case back in court, but I am paying money every month. You assumed full time student meant I didn't work. I do work, but the average salary in my country is much lower than the US. I am trying to get a better job hence the additional schooling to make me competitive in this market. You incorrectly assumed intercontinental travel when crossing between two adjacent countries is relatively cheap.

When the amount of support was set, were you a full time student working (I'm guessing) less than part time? Under what circumstance were you asking the court to lower the amount? I'll tell you that $1000/mo for a child, depending on the age of the child and the cost of child care and other incidentals (mainly insurance) isn't that high.

To answer your other question, you can contact the State Department to inquire of the status of your passport, but I would assume that it has already been revoked. They're pretty good about keeping up on at least that aspect of collection attempts.

The amount was originally set to include 75% of daycare costs. The child has been out of daycare for two years. The Florida Department of Children and Families told me they agreed the daycare portion was no longer valid, but the case wasn't eligible for review yet. For the two years the child was in elementary school, I paid for unused daycare plus I provided insurance. I also have family members available to provide child care for free if he would agree to their use.

The court will not set support based on you working in your home country. It will be set based on applicable Florida state law. You will likely be imputed an income since you are intentionally foregoing one. You appear to have the ability to pay $500 a month based on your ability to pay all the schooling and associated fees.

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Quoting AmandaSmith

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The amount was originally set to include 75% of daycare costs. The child has been out of daycare for two years. The Florida Department of Children and Families told me they agreed the daycare portion was no longer valid, but the case wasn't eligible for review yet. For the two years the child was in elementary school, I paid for unused daycare plus I provided insurance. I also have family members available to provide child care for free if he would agree to their use.

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He doesn't have to agree to use your family for child care and as a parent, I wouldn't agree to do it, either. That's asking for trouble and/or unnecessary drama. Why haven't you filed your own motion for modification outside of DCF? Why haven't you contacted an attorney to discuss your options?

I live in a country where higher education is paid for by the government.

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My lawyer has filed a motion for modification, but both the Department of Revenue and my ex must be served. The DoR was served last year. I have been trying unsuccessfully to serve my ex since then. (The person answering the door at the home he owns claims to have never heard of him although this is DCF's mailing address for him.) My lawyer suggested to wait until I was charged with contempt of court because that was I am guaranteed a court date. (I can't get one with only one party served). In response to the passport issue, he said I should wait for it to be revoked and then file a motion to reinstate it on the grounds that we have been unable to set a new hearing.

The family court or DOR doesn't have the AUTHORITY to reverse a passport revocation. That's FEDERAL law, so if your attorney recommended that that is the course of action you take, you need to look for another attorney - preferably one that knows what they're talking about. The ONLY way you're going to get your US passport reinstated is to pay the arrears. Even if you were to modify the support on Monday, it would do nothing for the arrears since support won't be modified retroactively. Your attorney should know that.

Also, are you prepared to have your income imputed because "I'm going to school" doesn't allow you to divest yourself of income so that you can accomplish your educational dreams and not make as much money as possible to contribute to the raising of your child.

Sorry, I missed some of the details you supplemented with before my last post. It contains inaccurate commentary.

If your passport is invalidated while you are traveling you will be effectively stuck in the country that you need it to travel from. Making the argument your lawyer suggests will not be effective at an embassy. You need to be prepared with the custodial parent coming back with requests for medical support to be factored in etc... A downward modification may not be forthcoming especially if custodial parent is on gov't services.

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Quoting CourtClerk

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The family court or DOR doesn't have the AUTHORITY to reverse a passport revocation. That's FEDERAL law, so if your attorney recommended that that is the course of action you take, you need to look for another attorney - preferably one that knows what they're talking about. The ONLY way you're going to get your US passport reinstated is to pay the arrears. Even if you were to modify the support on Monday, it would do nothing for the arrears since support won't be modified retroactively. Your attorney should know that.

Also, are you prepared to have your income imputed because "I'm going to school" doesn't allow you to divest yourself of income so that you can accomplish your educational dreams and not make as much money as possible to contribute to the raising of your child.

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That is not entirely correct CC. The feds don't revoke or suspend a passport unless requested to do so by the state, and will un-revoke or un-suspend a passport if requested to do so by the state...either based on the fact that the arrears were paid, OR based on the fact that the arrears were vacated...or based on some other reason the state might have. Child support is a state issue not a federal issue. The feds support the states and their determinations, they do not supercede the states.

So yes, the family court or the DOR DOES have the authority to reverse a passport decision, because they are the ones who requested the passport hold in the first place.

Now, that doesn't mean that I think that this OP's passport may get reinstated without payment of arrears, it just means that I disagree with your response.

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Quoting llworking

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Child support is a state issue not a federal issue. The feds support the states and their determinations, they do not supercede the states.

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You do realize that FEDERAL LAW supercedes STATE LAW... always, right? Didn't your accounting degree tell you that? That you disagree with my response? I'm shocked. That's never happened before, now has it? It happens almost as many times as I disagree with your responses. I'm sure your accounting degree (if you have one) has taught you a lot about family law.

I'd love to see one (actual) instance where a state has requested reinstatement of a passport based on... they need it? And you do realize that the OCSE and the tax intercept unit require arrears to be reduced to ZERO before they'll release a passport, don't you? It's right there in their own procedures that you've probably never seen a day in your life in your accounting office. Yes, that was sarcastic as HELL.

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Quoting CourtClerk

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You do realize that FEDERAL LAW supercedes STATE LAW... always, right? Didn't your accounting degree tell you that? That you disagree with my response? I'm shocked. That's never happened before, now has it? It happens almost as many times as I disagree with your responses. I'm sure your accounting degree (if you have one) has taught you a lot about family law.

I'd love to see one (actual) instance where a state has requested reinstatement of a passport based on... they need it? And you do realize that the OCSE and the tax intercept unit require arrears to be reduced to ZERO before they'll release a passport, don't you? It's right there in their own procedures that you've probably never seen a day in your life in your accounting office. Yes, that was sarcastic as HELL.

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If you are going to be sarcastic, then you really need to make sure that you are being sarcastic when you are correct.

Federal law only supercedes state law on those issues that are under federal jurisdiction as outlined by the US Constitution. Any other rights are reserved for the states. Once again passport holds and tax intercepts as well are matters where the feds support the states. The states tell them when to make the hold/intercept, and the state tells them when to stop the hold/intercept.

Just as an amusing hijack...

My better half works as a cruise travel agent, and I must hear the horror stories 2 or 3 times a week about people who call in because they have paid for a multi-thousand dollar cruise, only to show up and be refused boarding because their passports have been tagged as delinquent in child support. The poor idiots that didn't purchase travel insurance not only don't get to go on their cruise, but also don't get refunded their fare. It PAYS to pay one's support, to purchase travel insurance, and to read the fine print about travel and passport issues and who is going to eat costs associated with suspended passports. Several folk have attempted to recoup fares in court, but in only ONE case I'm aware of did the court order the cruise line to reimburse the fare - NOT to the traveling parent in arrears, but rather to the state child support collection agency, towards the arrears (sans cancellation and other fees).

</hijack>

The doggy has been sick, so here I am in the middle of the night again.

Here we go:

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encycloped...d-support.html



http://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/f...m-602-0036.pdf


http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/css/...denial-program

Y'all are welcome

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Quoting Dogmatique

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The doggy has been sick, so here I am in the middle of the night again.

Here we go:

http://www.nolo.com/legal-encycloped...d-support.html



http://www.uscis.gov/sites/default/f...m-602-0036.pdf


http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/css/...denial-program

Y'all are welcome

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Some tid-bits from Dog's links:

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Even being a U.S. citizen is not, however, enough in some cases. Under a program called “Passport Denial,” authorized by a 1997 amendment to a law called the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act (PRWORA), any person who owes child support in an amount greater than $2,500 will be denied a U.S. passport until the matter is cleared up. (At one time, the threshold was $5,000, but it was lowered to $2,500 in 2007.)

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Note: It says "until the matter is cleared up". That allows for more than just it being "paid" as a reason to un-suspend.

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The U.S. Passport Agency automatically receives information from a database kept by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). The information in this database originally comes from county district attorney offices that work on child enforcement, which reports support amounts owed (“arrearages”) to DHHS.

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Note: Its the state/county putting the people on the list, and therefore taking them off again.

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You will need to contact your local child support agency to make arrangements to pay your child support debt or otherwise reach some satisfactory agreement

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Again, its clearly up to the state/local child support enforcement.

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The Passport Denial Program, which is part of the Federal Offset Program, is designed to help states enforce delinquent child support obligations

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Again, clearly its to support the states.

Based on personal experience:

My husband worked for the same company for about 15 years and wasn't behind in support. Due to some unusual, very bizarre circumstances that I'm not going to get into here, he was hit with a HUGE judgment for arrearages well in excess of the $2,500. In fact, the judge was extremely upset about his own ruling, stated as much on the record, and wanted to certify his own ruling for automatic and immediate appeal because he believed the judgment was inequitable and wanted the case to go to a higher court. He said that he felt his hands were tied based on the law and believed that the issues were important enough to merit further review. We just didn't have the money to go through the appeals process.

Anyhow. After this happened my husband had to make a trip overseas for work. I (yes *I* even though it was my husband's case because I had the time to do this) got in contact with the two DCS caseworkers in two different states to get the passport hold LIFTED. I didn't contact the State Department. They had nothing to do with it. The STATE DCS is the entity that contacts the State Dept to issue passport holds & releases.

Having said all of that, my husband did have to get a letter from his employer stating the travel was going to become an integral part of his job. The two caseworkers worked closely together, with me, and got the hold released within two days.

So, yeah......the bit about the Feds controlling is not accurate.

So y'all know I'm not pulling this stuff out my ass...

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PASSPORT REINSTATEMENT PROCESS

When the NCP makes a request for reinstatement of passport privileges to local CSS, responsible caseworkers must determine whether that NCP meets the criteria for reinstatement.

If reinstatement is appropriate, caseworkers should:

Provide the NCP with a copy of the "Passport Reinstatement Information/Instructions" document.
Explain the reinstatement process to the NCP:
NC CSS sends a request to the Federal Office of Child Support Enforcement (OCSE) to remove the NCP's name from the passport denial file.
OCSE notifies the U.S. Department of State in the next weekly file update. It can take up to ten to fifteen (10-15) business days from the date of the state's deletion request for the passport to be issued.
Once the NC CSS has notified OCSE to lift the restriction, the NCP can expedite the process by contacting the National Passport Agency at the telephone number shown on the passport denial letter and requesting that the passport status be updated and the application processed.
Obtain the following information from the NCP to assist in processing the request and for statistical purposes:
The NCP's name (as it appears on the birth certificate;
The NCP's place of birth (city and state);
The NCP's current address;
The NCP's home and work telephone numbers;
The name of the passport agency that appears on the passport denial letter that the NCP received;
The reason for reinstatement (EX: payment of arrearages, emergency, submitted in error) and the reason for the planned travel (EX: employment, vacation, military deployment, etc.)
Send a request to the Tax Intercept Unit, asking them to process the request for removal of the passport denial and providing the information that was obtained from the NCP in Step #3.
Tax Intercept Unit workers must do the following:

Verify that the NCP's arrearage balance has been reduced to zero ($0.00).
Document local CSS’s request that the NCP’s name be removed from the passport denial file, including the reason for reinstatement.
Request that OCSE remove the NCP's name from the passport denial file. OCSE notifies the Department of State when the restriction has been lifted.

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